


Needle in the Hay

by Devolucao



Category: Eyeshield 21
Genre: F/M, M/M, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-20
Updated: 2010-10-20
Packaged: 2017-10-12 19:16:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/128176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devolucao/pseuds/Devolucao
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rui grasps at straws.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Needle in the Hay

Rui has a knack for timing. He waits exactly one minute after Megu rolls off of him, while she's reaching across the tv-table for her pack of smokes, to pop the question.

He reaches over to brush the hair off of her sweaty neck, and murmurs sweetly: "Babe, I've been thinking. We should do a threesome. Just hear me out--"

She makes a disgusted noise and lights up, bangles on her wrist clinking irritably as she flicks the lighter open/shut, quick as his hand on a balisong, possibly more deadly. Rolls back over and snatches a cushion from under his head, winds back and pops him right across the face with it. He lets it tumble onto his lap.

She slips off the couch, pads half naked across the floor, and begins picking through the pile of discarded clothes, leaving her cigarette to smolder on the edge of an ashtray.

Rui first checks to make sure his nose isn't bleeding, then rakes his hair back and hits her with the old puppy-dog eyes. "Look, we don't have to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. But just think it over. Consider."

She pauses and sighs at him, then brusquely tugs on rumpled high-water pants, loose A-shirt, tunic dress and belt. "I told you, I'm not into girls."

"That's not what I meant," he grunts, arching up to crack his back. "I meant, like, you, me, and another guy."

She stalks past him on her way to the kitchen, and he may as well be inquiring about the stock market for all her reaction. Never bats an eye, which is how he knows she's either truly furious, or merely humoring him.

He gives her ten minutes. He stands up on wobbly giraffe legs and steps into his pants, leans one teetering body-length across the room to stub out Megu's cigarette, and waits. He sits and fingers the t.v. remote, and stares at the blank screen. He watches the doorway--hears the refrigerator door slam, silverware rattling, all that sort of thing--and thinks ten minutes is a good long time to sit and be at home with how badly you might've just cocked things up.

He scratches a fleck of dried spunk off of his belly, and waits.

Ten minutes with Megu is pretty standard. Any longer than that, he knows to start worrying. Viz, when he lied about where and with whom he'd been several nights ago, she'd stopped talking to or even looking at him for a full twelve minutes. The hospital trip got him thirty tight-lipped, hard-eyed, white knuckled minutes; but he'd count that case as exceptional.

Five minutes for sneaking text messages during training, ten for being late, and a whack across the shoulders with her bokutou.

Rui sneaks a look at his watch.

She comes out with a sandwich in one hand and her purse in the other. It's been fifteen minutes. The bread's not even toasted. It's just plain whole wheat with peanut-butter and banana: her favorite comfort food. "Were you timing me?" She laughs, and she's shifting the purse to her shoulder, she's got her letter jacket on, she hasn't bothered with a plate.

Rui scrambles to sit up. "You leaving? Hey, whoa, come on. Can we at least discuss this? Babe, please. Megu!"

She comes round behind him, then stops. "All right."

Rui cranes his head back, remote still in hand. "All right? Yeah?"

"We'll discuss it."

"Babe, you're awesome. Kiss me, come on." He tips his head back and sticks out his tongue, just lays it on out there.

"God, You're such a freak." She pecks him on the side of the mouth, then wallops him across the shoulder with her purse. "Dinner tonight?"

Rui lets out a long breath and flops backwards across the couch. "Eight o'clock. I'll wear somethin' pretty. I'll wear a miniskirt."

Megu laughs and threatens to wallop him again, but reconsiders at the last second. "I bet your father would love that."

Rui snorts and rubs his eye; the knuckle comes away smudged black, and he imagines he must look like holy hell. "I'll wear a thong," he growls, reaches up with one hand and tugs lightly at the collar of her jacket. "And tonight, while they're all down here watching god-damn Tokyo evening news, I'll let you tie me up, bend me over that desk up in my room--"

She smirks and takes another bite of her sandwich. "Oh you will?"

He tugs again--lightly still, because she's eating. "And fucking peg my ass." Raises his knees and plants his heels on the armrest. "Hard."

She swallows and screws up her lips. "Oh I _will_?"

"Shit, yeah. I mean, if you wanna wear the miniskirt an' all, that's fine by me. I'm still wearing a thong."

"Mm-h'm." She rocks idly forward on her toes, then tips back, quarter of a sandwich still in hand. But she's grinning, now. "Swear to god, Rui, you're not about to go off and become like this huge fag on me, are you?"

Rui gives her a dire look from beneath lowered brows; he stretches his legs out over the armrest, his arms up over his head, knuckles dragging the table-top behind. "You shouldn't swear, Megu. Swearin's bad. You could go to hell."

She shakes her head slowly and takes another two bites. She's watching him carefully, like she's been watching him for the past three weeks, since that long long car-ride, since that cold quite midnight twenty-four hours later. Watching him, ever since, 'because it's clear your parents aren't'. "You really scare me, sometimes. You know that?"

Rui knows she's just saying it to say it, now that the panic's over. It's finally okay to make jokes around her again, say all the same silly shit he usually says and not have her take it as 'a sign'. He still hasn't gotten his knife back. He thinks she must still have it for safe-keeping, and he's surprised to find he's okay with that. "Come on, seriously."

"No, you come on, seriously." She stuffs the last big chunk of sandwich into her mouth and reaches for the half-empty, and probably lukewarm bottle of Ramune by Rui's wrist. The fingers of her free hand dip into his upturned palm, sharp and cool, and press down there while she drinks. It's not an idle gesture. She's checking out the scars.

Rui does not cling desperately to her, does not even let one finger curl; he just lies there and lets her. "I'll be okay, babe. I promise."

She keeps her hand there a good long while, looks him over, his hair, his face, his eyes, and probably doesn't believe him worth shit. "All right," she says, then walks round and gives him one last kiss, grabbing his chin forcefully so he can't try anything, and on her way out to the foyer: "Call Youichi. Just do it, okay? He's been leaving me messages all week asking if you're still alive."

Rui laughs dryly and rolls onto his side, the couch wheezes under him, and he's all about getting up to put things back in order, reset himself--the things he's managed to shake loose with a few minutes of desperate grinding and stroking--reset his surroundings.

He hears her stepping into her boots, and hears the latch turn, hears her pause half-way out. He's shoving wadded facial tissue, half-eaten take-out, kari-raissu, empty Ramune bottle, and used chopsticks into the empty conbini bag. ('Thank You for Coming') Megu's half smoked cigarette he leaves, appropriate evidence he thinks: neither too little nor too much. He's eyeing his cell, but he's in no rush to pick it up.

"Call him," she shouts. "I'm going now!"

The door clicks quietly shut, and Rui waits. He waits exactly ten minutes before he shrugs into his rumpled camp shirt, and bows half-way across the long, antique coffee-table for his cell.

He drops back to the couch and folds in on himself. It's only then, as his thumb absently clicks through and stops on the right number--the sweet-spot--that he looks up and around, takes in the height of the vaulted, chalet-style ceiling; the cool breadth of tastefully pale stucco walls; the large brick accents; the long length of champagne colored couch on which they'd conscientiously spread a large beach-towel; and the spacious expanse of carpeted floor under his bare feet. His dad would have a justifiable coronary if he knew what they were getting up to in this room, on the couch, on the floor, and against that wide pale window overlooking the pool.

The phone rings for-damned-ever before he finally picks up.

"Hey, fucking chameleon, we missed you after the game last week. Couldn't stand the pressure, huh?"

Rui nods and scrubs at his forehead, doesn't matter there's no-one around to see. "You got me pegged, Deimon." He's not going to apologize. He's not going to let on how much he owes this guy. Not over a cell. "I folded, just like I always do. You expected anything less?"

There's a rusty cackle on the other end: comforting. "Hey. Don't be so down on yourself. I've got somebody keeping tabs on you, twenty-four hour surveillance. They report this shit back to me, every last bit of information like what you ate, what hand you use to jerk off. I find out you've been miserable, you don't wanna know what'll happen."

"You'll fucking kill me?" He can almost see Hiruma grinning, and he can almost feel it start to slip.

"I'll be charging my laser beam."

Rui laughs, and he couldn't give less of a shit how broken he sounds. Hiruma's just about seen it all by now. Everything up until the wads of paper-toweling, him hastily trying to mop up after realizing what he's just gone and done, telling Megu not to come in, making some excuse about his stomach, already worrying about his ruined clothes. About the stains in the tile grout, which still haven't come entirely clean.

Rui does want to say it wasn't all that serious. That if he'd really, truly meant it, he wouldn't still be here. He wants to say a lot of things. "You still there, fucking ears?" He can hear chewing noises, then a pop, and he knows what an idiot he must sound.

Hiruma grunts softly. "So, was it up the road, or across the street?"

Rui turns his arms over, as if he needs to confirm it for himself. "Do you think I'm like one of those sad fucks who just sits in a dark room all day, writing awful poetry and hating my parents? Do I strike you as that type?" He's not asking to be confrontational, no matter how it sounds. He's as curious as anything what Hiruma thinks, what goes on in that spiky bleached head of his.

Hiruma's answer is a dismissive 'tss' and: "You've got problems, Rui, but I don't ever recall there being some prerequisite state by which it's acceptable to carve yourself up." There's a pause, more rapid-fire chewing. "You gonna talk to somebody?"

"I'm talkin' to you, aren't I?" He doesn't bother asking when Hiruma found out, nor how: either Megu told him as part of some off-hand guilt-trip, or there's been some form of extortion involved. Knowing Megu, knowing Hiruma, he'd say the odds are fifty-fifty each way. Extortion, threats, violence and guilt. Rui sure does know how to pick 'em.

Another dry little cackle, short and sharp like the one-two report of a pistol. "How do you know you can trust me? How do you know I'm not logging all this shit for future nefarious purposes?" He's being cagey, like he's not so sure he _wants_ Rui to trust him.

"Maybe you should be," Rui snorts, reaching up to wipe at the smudges around his eyes again. "It was up the road and across the street. I got confused which was which about half-way...made a real big mess."

"Rui, aw hell--"

"Aw hell, don't you give me that concerned bullshit," Rui snarls, glaring at empty air, at a blank hi-def t.v. screen in a very large room. "That is so entirely unlike you, you know that?"

There's a long stretch where the only sound is Hiruma's quiet breathing, then this naked little voice, crackling a bit: "Tell me how else I'm supposed to react. You expect me to just laugh it off, 'ke-ke, that's not how you handle a knife, shitty chameleon'? Why not, you served your purpose...got all the use out of you I needed, so long and good luck?"

Rui sometimes forgets, behind the hair, the piercings, the filed teeth and heavy artillery, the kid's human after all. If anything, given how bloody passionate he is about amefuto, about Deimon, he's like an emotional thresher, all whirling blades and constant revolution. Hiruma doesn't just snap at you when you screw up, he screams. He rages. He lets you _know_.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't be laying this on you. I'll go."

"No, you won't." He says it calmly, easily. "Listen to me. I feel shitty about what happened, I feel shitty about leaving you like that, and if you want, you can pin the blame squarely on me as a lousy fucking friend. You can resent me, you can hate me, you can make me your slave, whatever favor you need, I'll jump. But you cannot, _cannot_ expect me to sit idly by and watch as you self-destruct. You got that?"

Rui nods.

"Don't just nod at me." Terse, words like bullets. Hiruma can't see, but he can sure as hell predict how an opponent will move. "Tell me you got that."

Rui hunches his shoulders. "I got it."

"Damn skippy. What are you doing right now?"

"Why, you need an extra tackle-block down at the field or something?" Rui sits up and stretches, arching to crack his back again, shift his pelvis back in place, crack his toes, his ankles, his knees, and his shoulder next the the phone. He checks his watch. "I can give you a few hours, but me 'n Megu have plans tonight."

"No, it's nothing like that."

"What? So, you just wanna hang out? Or--you wanna ride the bike again, don't you?" Rui's smiling now, picturing the way Hiruma would perch himself on the bitch-seat like he owned the motherfucker, the way he'd howl into the wind. How relaxed his hands were on Rui's hips, how his knees would press just a little tighter around turns, how expertly he'd shift when Rui shifted, leaning in when he leaned.

"That's it, isn't it? Miss the feel of hot, vibrating metal between your legs?"

A rusty cackle, and Hiruma's nothing if not quick on the rebound. "I've got one at home. It's five speed, runs on lithium batteries."

"Why am I not shocked?"

"It's got this crazy rotary action," Hiruma adds, gleefully. "Powers up like a fucking semi-automatic. Ratatat. You'd love it."

"Right. You want me to come pick you up, or what?"

"Yeah. Meet me outside the school, ten minutes. I'll be waiting."

Rui's out the door before the connection's even dropped, he's halfway into his leather jacket--the old comfortable one, the beat-up old thing he sometimes grabs without thinking--and zip-boots unzipped. Why he's in such an all-fire hurry, he can't say. This isn't like all those other times with the threat of possible motor dismemberment looming ever-fresh over his head.

He thinks maybe he's grasping at straws, or something like that, laughing ruefully to himself as he chokes the throttle and roars out of the driveway. Ordinarily, he'd stop and smoke-out a bit, make sure he leaves a nice black skid up and down the drive, but not today. The road slips beneath him, everything blurs past, and it's somewhat less than ten minutes before he's staring Hiruma down across a short expanse of manicured grass.

Hiruma doesn't pause for niceties, just stalks up with his duffel over one shoulder, eyes blazing, and slings himself onto the back of the bike; straddles it like he owns the bitch, and grabs firm hold of Rui's hips. "You smell like sex," he notes bluntly, voice sharp in the ozone tinged autumn air. "I didn't take you away from anything, did I?" The tip of his nose is a cold hard kiss like steel, something dangerous, illicit.

Rui shifts and settles himself purposefully, and he is not hedging out of guilt or anything as he guns the engine, lets her purr. "Where to?"

"The park by the lake," Hiruma snaps. "Let's go see some fucking foliage!"

Rui kicks off hard.

He thinks it's fitting that Hiruma doesn't get a real good look at him until they've sat down, tumbling wind-tossed and breath-sapped onto the cool grass at the hump of a hill.

Also fitting that Hiruma doesn't spare him an ounce of tact, just shoves a compact mirror in his face, grinning. "Personally, I think it suits you."

Rui rakes his hair back, angrily wipes a wayward streak of kohl from high up on his cheek. He was pretty liberal with the stuff this morning, wasn't thinking about the original dark circles under his eyes, just dashed it on and that was it. Camouflage in place, hair gelled, waxed, greased, sprayed to within an inch of its life, he's never given much thought to how, bit by bit, throughout the day, things tend to fall apart.

Rui frowns, and it adds about ten years to his face. He could just about fucking cry.

Hiruma's not grinning anymore. He's not even smiling. "I'm not gonna ask what was going through your skull," he says roughly, a flick of eye movement following Rui's wrist into its sleeve. "I'm not your therapist."

Rui lies back and folds his arms behind his head, stretches out, shirt riding up his belly, and closes his eyes. Squeezes them tightly shut and swallows it all back. "I'm not expecting you to be."

"You feel like talking, though," a whisper of grass. "I'll listen."

The light behind Rui's eyelids is warm, dark maroon, then bright red when a ray of sun hits. He opens up to see it pierce through the clouds, then gently slide away again. This serene shit isn't usually his style, but it's nice, he thinks. The other guys can have a damn field-day with this. He's decided he no longer cares what they think. "You must have a wealth of material on me by now. You must know shit about my family even I don't know. There anybody in your little sphere of influence that hasn't ended up in that book?"

Hiruma's lying flat on his back, arms also folded behind his head, duffel by his elbow, right between them. "Man, are you paranoid," he snickers, reaching into his zip-front, military style over-shirt, brandishing the little black book of infamy, then flipping it open. "Rui, Habashira, blood-type B, position: inside line-backer. You like spicy foods, you've never had the chicken pox, and you value that fucking bike more than your own life."

"That all?"

Hiruma snaps the book shut, slaps it down on his own chest and grins sidelong at Rui. "Only what's pertinent, fucking chameleon."

"You know, I think my father's got a mistress," Rui hisses. "Why don't you put that in there?"

"I'm not interested in your fucking dad."

"I might be bisexual, I think about dudes all the time."

"Congratulations, does your girlfriend know?"

Rui unfolds his arms, shakes some of the feeling back into his fingers, and resettles them across his chest. "Sometimes I go out alone at night, into rough neighborhoods, hopin' I'll get jumped."

"Sure, I hear Omotesando's pretty scary after dark. You wanna watch out for those salary-men." He's angling for something, that much is clear.

Rui barks out a sigh. "You know, when I first thought about doin' it, I pictured sliding out on my bike or something. Swerving into oncoming traffic, or just gunning it--" he lifts his hands and chokes an invisible throttle, up-shifts, eases off the brakes. "Going as fast as I could until it spun out of control, over an embankment, into a bridge abutment. Couldn't do it, though. Too afraid I'd damage it."

This, at last, leaves Hiruma silent. He's listening.

"You know, they wanted to keep me in the hospital a few days? If it weren't for my dad--" He lets his arms drop to his sides, clutches fistfuls of grass, digs his nails in, scraping dirt. Yeah, grasping at something, that seems appropriate. "What about yours? You got issues with your old man, I bet."

"Who doesn't," is Hiruma's retort, sharp and defensive; a steel trap sprung shut.

"The hair, the piercings, your attitude--"

"Don't waste your time analyzing me, fucking chameleon. Better people have tried and failed."

Rui shifts to sit up, leans back on his elbows, hands tucked under his hips, the way he's always been comfortable. "Hiruma, Youichi, blood type: O negative, ideal donor, eh? Position: quarterback and strong safety. You like sugar-free gum, black coffee--you drink two or three cups a day just to stay awake in class, you catch every damn cold that comes your way, and you value amefuto more than your own life."

Hiruma laughs delightedly at this. "You building an extortion file or a fucking fan-book?" He snaps into position, back on his elbows, hands curled into his sides. "You left out the illegal fire-arms, I'm afraid. Very sloppy work."

"Your dog ain't licensed, or neutered, is he?"

"Not really my dog."

"You mis allocate school funds well in excess of what's reasonable for a small football club, you're running an illegal gambling parlor outta that clubhouse; you've falsified medical records, school records, hacked into the computers of a major mainstream news outlet, libeled, slandered--"

"You really want to do this?" Hiruma interrupts calmly, quietly. "I could hand you a fucking goldmine worth of information on me, sufficient to land me in prison, or deported back to America." He pauses suddenly, then smirks, guileless as can be. "Whoops, let something slip there!"

Rui has no doubt that was calculated. He lets Hiruma continue, regardless; picking at blades of grass and watching him talk, posture, react. Not for any nefarious purposes of his own, but because--he can admit it--Hiruma's not bad to look at.

"You could easily use that," says Hiruma, and he's watching right back with sharp eyes, pink cheeks, parted lips. "You don't give yourself that much credit, I know, but you're pretty brilliant. Grades don't reflect that, naturally, since you do just the bare minimum to get by, never study, skip every two out of five classes, and regularly stay up all night running with that gang of yours. You're up there in the rankings as one of the better linemen in all of Tokyo, not for nothing, though."

Rui shakes his head. "Next, you're going to tell me 'if you could just apply yourself...'"

"That's all up to you. Personally," Hiruma leans forward another fraction. "I don't care about that. Less competition, the way I see things."

"What, you thinking about becoming a Lizard? My bro would have you for lunch-meat, Youichi."

"No." His eyes narrow, glinting steely in the afternoon haze. "Fighting Irish, Notre-fucking-Dame. Aim right for the top and accept nothing less."

"Do they know that?" Meaning the rest of the Devilbats, and here, Rui's got him dead to rights. No calculation on Hiruma's part.

The park's no longer quite as deserted as when they arrived, there are people about, just beyond the periphery of where they sit--like two bookends in the grass. Sounds of shouting, laughter, music, filtering through the silence that stretches out, through the quiet whisper of Hiruma's breathing, and the crinkle of foil as he feeds a piece of gum--sugar free--into his mouth.

"That's not our main concern right now." Hiruma sits up all the way, wipes his hands off on his duffel. "Our main concern is reaching the Christmas bowl, that's all." He stands and reaches down for the shoulder strap, and it looks for a second like he's getting ready to leave.

Only for a second, then he's got a football tucked into the crook of his arm, he's smiling down at Rui, an invitation and a dare. "You ever dance with the devil by the pale moonlight?" This in perfect, if accented English.

Rui shrugs to his feet and out of his jacket, forgetting he's in short sleeves underneath, that everything else is medical tape and gauze, raw edges peeking out, and how ugly it looks. He sets his jaw and stretches, shakes out the kinks in his legs, settles easily into defensive position.

They lock eyes.

Hiruma drops back, barking audibles, mimes the snap, the pass, the completion, and he charges, head down, shoulders squared.

He's quick, he damn near gets past: smart enough to take Rui's long reach into account, and practiced enough to avoid it.

Still, Rui catches hold of him, takes him down with ease. No need for the rough stuff, just a quick tumble, a moment to lie across him, winded--and Hiruma's body is just as hard, as sharply pointed as you'd expect by looking at him--take inventory of their positions, their place on the makeshift field, then up and at it again. Hiruma begins keeping score soon after that: first down, his ball. Thirty minutes fly by, the two of them sweating, dirtied, breathing hard.

They've moved down from the crest of the hill, and by unanimous decision, a pair of trees, roughly equidistant at forty yards, serve as goal-posts, the branches as uprights.

"Kah, you can't kick worth shit, Deimon." Rui's had to run after the ball again, saving it from another very short trip to the bottom of the pond, by a very narrow margin. "Quit tryin'."

"That was a squib. We're tied now, forty-two forty-two. Ready for the sudden death round?"

Rui would rather not admit how morbidly appropriate the statement is: as he reaches up to wipe the sweat from his neck, he notices a few of his scabs have broken. This, judging by the fresh sting, and dried smears of blood around his bandages. "Fuck."

Hiruma's already coming towards him, frowning. "Do you need a time-out?"

"It's not that bad," Rui mutters. Bad enough to stain his shirt, bad enough to embarrass. Bad enough that Megu's going to kill his ass, probably.

"Let me tape it up." It's not an offer. Not a question of refusal.

They don't even bother sitting down: Hiruma grabs a well-used roll of sports-tape and box of large plasters from his duffel bag, unopened bottle of clean water--which he douses liberally over Rui's arms--and patches him up where he stands, with football wedged safely between his own two feet.

"There you go," Hiruma snaps, brisk, business-like. Back into his bag go the plasters and tape, and out comes a kick-post. "Looks like we'll decide this with a field goal."

Rui stares at him for a full second, really leers like he hasn't had a chance to do in so long. "So, we're gonna' discard all the rules just because a player's 'injured'? Rather unconventional, even for you."

A flash of shark teeth, not a grin but a snarl. "Fine, call it pity if you want. I don't give a fuck." Hiruma bends and slaps the kick-tee into the grass, slams the ball into place, and drops back for his wind-up.

His kick fails spectacularly, missing not only the tree and the uprights, but a pair of frisbee players several yards further on.

Rui doesn't bother running after it this time. He checks his watch, sees that it's still early yet, and lowers himself onto the grass. It prickles his sweat damp skin, uncomfortable, but he pays it no nevermind. "I can live with a tie," he says, finally. "That good enough for the star quarterback here?"

Hiruma stands over him, breathing deep, even breaths, stomach rising and falling smoothly beneath his tight black tee. The rising points of his collarbone are dashed red, distinct outline of Rui's fingerprints fading into blush.

"S'fine," He grunts, scanning the park with serious eyes, hardened cheekbones, line of his jaw tensing and smoothing as he chews, working that gum like it's his job.

He finally jogs off, after a moment, to retrieve the ball. Or rather, scoop it up and send it sailing over Rui's head, pitching into the dirt between his spread knees. Not a near miss, not by any stretch, and Hiruma's grinning again as he comes pelting back, slings himself to the ground beside Rui.

He's much closer than before. It doesn't occur to him that maybe they shouldn't.

It's just a moment, just something that happens: Rui surging forward on his knees, climbing over Hiruma, pushing him backwards by the shoulders, and kissing him like he means to take his damn time about it. Hiruma smells like mint and dirt, like football and cotton. It's just a kiss, one long-ass kiss that leaves him with a bruised lip and a scraped tongue. But it's worth it when Hiruma winds both hands through his hair and touches his face with sharp thumbs, just strokes him there, firm, until he pulls back.

They're quick to leave the park after that, clamoring awkwardly--Hiruma hissing and patently adjusting his fly--onto Rui's bike.

"I need to get home and shower," Rui announces into the wind. His grip on the handlebars is white-knuckled, as nervous and furious as Hiruma's hold on his waist.

Hiruma's fingers digging into the points of his hips, to where there'd be bruises if it weren't for the added cushion of Rui's jeans and jacket. Hiruma's knees clapped to him, and Hiruma's breathing jagged by his ear, against his neck. Hiruma's hips jerking fractionally with every jolt, every dip in the road.

If not for the bike, if not for their speed, Rui gets the sense that Hiruma would have him right there and then. As it is, he barely waits until they're inside, until the door's slammed, to spin Rui by his lapels and mash him up against the wall, sinking angry and desperate between his thighs, bent knees to give him leverage.

And it's a damn good thing nobody's home. Hiruma comes with a shocked growl, a yelp, thrusting hard enough to leave friction burns, red marks from his chin where it digs into Rui's cheek. And Rui hard enough on the down-stroke that his hip pops out, then back in, almost dumping him on his ass were it not for Hiruma's hand wedged back there. It takes him longer to get there, Hiruma's other hand down the front of his pants, kneading and stroking, choking it.

He moans when it happens, doesn't care if he's loud, doesn't care if it's messy, his arms around Hiruma's shoulders, winglike, holding tight until the last contraction. He makes an utter fool of himself and doesn't care, buries his face in Hiruma's neck, burrows fingers deep into the bleached tangle of his hair.

"Shit," Hiruma whispers, retracting his hand, gently wiping it off on Rui's pant leg before resting it, warm and clammy, on his hip. Jostling him purposely, grabbing his attention. "You gonna be okay?"

"Uh-huh." The word is a gasp, a rusty croak. Rui doesn't cling desperately, but lets go, slowly, gradually allowing Hiruma to pull back and look him over.

They shower separately and dress separately; Hiruma raids the fridge and eats a great lot of Rui's food. There is no more kissing, no more conversation. Just watching, just cagey glances, two animals circling one another, right up until Rui drops him back at the school--neutral ground--and then it's: "I'll call you, later, after your date. Behave yourself, fucking chameleon."

Rui has a knack for timing. He chokes the throttle and kicks off, leaving Deimon and Hiruma in the dust.

"Yeah," He mutters, leaning low into the wind. "All right."


End file.
